Edith and Ben
by chris the cynic
Summary: Twilight with the focus shifted to emotional attraction from the canonical physical attraction and also with all the characters gender flipped.
1. Preface

When you're lying bleeding on the ground, realizing that the thing flowing from your body isn't so much blood as it is the hope that you'll live to see another day and trying desperately to control your heartbeat out of the silly belief that maybe, just maybe, if it weren't beating so hard and pushing the blood out of you so fast you'd live long enough to be rescued -because it might not be a realistic expectation but at times like these you grasp at whatever presents itself- you find that the situation is actually remarkably conducive to reflection.

It might not be the cleanest type of reflection ever, there are tangents and subordinate clauses that takeover entire paragraphs, the thinking might not always be strictly linear, and the leaps might not always make sense, but what else are you going to when lying bleeding on the ground if not think about how you got there? It's certainly more pleasant than thinking about the killer in the corner, ready to finish the job she so expertly started.

And so I found myself faced with a simple question: if I had known, if I had somehow impossibly known, what was going to happen going in, would I have gone to Forks? If just had a general idea, if it had been explained to me in the simplest terms and most convenient definitions, then of course I wouldn't. There's no chance in Hell, Dante's or otherwise.

But if I had understanding of what would go in Forks -if I knew what would happen to me and who I would meet and how I would feel- if I knew, in detail, _how_ I would end up here, dying on this floor, then the answer is equally clear and completely opposite: I wouldn't have missed it for the world.


	2. Chapter 1: Phoenix

I come from a family where no one says what they mean, and consequently no one means what they say. For my mother and I that's because we don't talk much, but for my father's side of the family it really does seem to be a complete aversion to saying what you mean. This means nothing is ever taken at face value, or expected to be taken at face value.

This may work for some people, but it does not work for me. It just doesn't. I want to cut the point and speak plainly, not navigate the confusing social waters of double talk and hidden meanings. That, I supposed, was one thing I wouldn't be missing. I looked out the window at the perfect cloudless sky. That was something I would be missing. You can still get a sunburn through a cloud, but you can't see the dome of the sky, and I was headed to a place whose single defining feature was having the fewest clear days of anywhere in the US.

My mother's home.

It rains on this small town more than any other in the country, and my mother loved it there, still did as far as I knew. My father disliked it as much as I did, and the differing communications styles between my mother and father probably played no small roll in their breakup, but as I said, no one ever says what they mean. And so I have always been told that the reason my father left, taking me with him, was largely due to the climate.

A lie, almost certainly, but my father comes from a long line of liars. And I'm next in that line, and a lie was my justification for going back to my mother's home in spite of the fact that I, like my father before me, am a desert creature. Phoenix is my home, and if need be I have little doubt that I could walk without rhythm.

I do believe that climate played a role in the decision to leave, how could it not, but I don't believe that divorces are made based on climate. There has to be more to it than that, I've just never been told what that more is. Likely never will be.

When I was less than a year old was when the divorce took place, and getting the truth about the here and now out of my father is difficult enough, the past is lost. Forks, my mother's home, was a place I remembered from the summers that came after. One month of every year, in the summer, was spent with my mother. And in the beginning that meant one month of every year was spent in Forks.

When I was fourteen I demanded that things change. I was young, I was stupid, and I was hurtful. I didn't think about the fact that I was telling my mother I cared more about the climate than I did about seeing her. I didn't think about how much it costs to pick up everything and stay for two weeks in Califorina every year. I didn't think about the fact that I had effectively cut the time I spent with my mother in half while increasing her financial burdens by who knows how much.

No. I didn't think about any of that. I thought that I was being an adult. I knew what was best and I was putting my foot down.

And in response my mother did the most amazing thing. She did what I asked, that summer, and the next two summers we spent two weeks together on the California coast. _She taught me how to surf._ I still don't fully understand how she was able to pay for it, but she never complained.

And so the time I spent with my mother had been cut in half, from one month to two weeks, and the time I spent in Forks had been cut to zero. I'm sure, at the time, I meant to stay in contact with the few friends I had in the area, three children from the nearby reservation that happened to be the children of my mother's best friend. I wondered idly if any of them would remember me, as I tried to take in everything I was leaving behind.

I loved Phoenix. I loved the image of a fiery bird rising from its own ashes, I loved the heat, I loved the city life, I loved looking at the stars on a cloudless night. I loved the desert.

I didn't much like the sunburns, but like I said you can burn through clouds too.

And I was leaving all of it. And I couldn't say why. I couldn't say why because I come from a family where no one ever says what they mean, and consequently no one ever means what they say. So if I came out and said to my father, "I want you to be able to travel the country with your new girlfriend and having to stay here with me is preventing that, not to mention that having to keep a house you no longer need is a serious financial burden," it wouldn't be taken to mean... all those things I just said. It would be taken to mean, "I want you to talk me out of this and am pissed off that you seem more interested in your girlfriend and finances than me," which a) isn't true and b) isn't true.

So I said I wanted to. Which is an obvious lie. And I stuck with that lie. And I was grateful that my father was letting me ride in silence rather than pressuring me for reasons and thus making it so I had to choose between lying more and possibly screwing the whole thing up.

That blissful silence ended at the airport. He said, "Ben, you don't have to do this." Which was in fact true, I don't have to do anything. I have free will, insofar as anyone does because I am not about to get derailed into a freewill vs. determinism debate. But the problem was, he didn't mean that. What he meant was, "I want you to do this but I don't want to feel guilty for exerting pressure on you so I'm giving you an out by pretending I'm trying to talk you out of it." I come from a family where no one ever says what the mean, and consequently no one ever means what they say.

At this point I'd had almost, but not quite (three years short of quite), two decades of having to decode meaning from things said but not meant and, while it tripped me up still, something as simple as, "You don't have to do this," was well within my capabilities.

This was definitely on the list of things that I would not miss. I tried to keep that in the front of my mind when I lied by saying, "I want to do this," looking my father straight in the eyes. He looked like an older version of me and a younger version of my grandfather. The men in my family look like a series of clones. Where I took after my mother was in things mental, not things physical.

As I looked at him I worried about leaving him alone, I don't remember how he got by before I was old enough to help, my memory of years gone by is less than stellar, but I did remember that in the most recent years I'd been very much involved in keeping bills paid and food in the refrigerator. It wasn't that he didn't have enough money to live on, it was that he didn't manage it. Then I reminded myself that he had Phyllis now, she was clearly capable of taking care of her own finances, and add her income to whatever was gained by selling the house and the expenses shed by no longer having it and he'd be sure to do fine.

"Tell Charlize I said, 'Hi.'" he said.

"I will," I'm not sure if my relief came through in my voice now that I could say something that wasn't a lie.

"I'll see you soon," I somehow doubted that, "And if you change your mind that's fine." More double talk. it did, at least, means some of what he was indicating. If I were to change my mind he would be there for me, but the "fine" was something I new better than to take at face value. It meant if I changed my mind he'd grudgingly do the things necessary to accommodate my return. That's not what "fine" is supposed to mean, but it's what it meant here.

"Don't worry about me," I said. A dangerously honest sincere request. God knew what it would mean once put through my father's internal decoder. "It'll be great," an outright lie and so therefore probably safe. "I love you, dad." True.

We shook hands, then I got on the plane.


	3. Chapter 1: Washington

It takes about three hours to get from Phoenix to Seattle, not counting airport security, the fact that half the time your bags have been mailed to Hawaii by mistake (didn't happen, thank all gods non-fictional and otherwise), and everything else that goes wrong.

Forks is, of course, on the corner of "no" and "where". That's why you don't fly to it directly. You don't even fly to it indirectly. From Seattle you take a smaller plane, called a "puddle jumper" thus finally allowing me to get the joke in _Stargate: Atlantis_, to a smaller airport at Port Angeles, which is still not Forks.

Port Angeles bills itself as "The Authentic Northwest," sorry rest of the Northwest, you're knock-offs, apparently. Then again, Forks bills itself as "The Logging Capital Of The World," when I'm pretty sure it's not the capital of anything anywhere. So you can't judge things based on what they say about themselves.

More important is probably Port Angeles' official motto: _The Center of it All on the Olympic Peninsula_. The peninsula is mostly national park, which doesn't give a lot of opportunity to hit an airport and probably explains why "The Center of it All" happens to be located on the north shore. The point here being that "The Logging Capital" was located about an hour down 101 West from "The Center of it All".

And that's how you get to Forks: take a big plane to a small plane; take a small plane to an hour long drive. Give or take. It depends on traffic conditions.

Three hours on one plane, another hour on a second one, that didn't bother me so much. An hour trapped in a car with my mother, Charlize, was another matter. I'd had no idea what to expect.

I'd only talked to her about this over the phone and via email. She'd been nice enough, even seemed genuinely pleased that I was going to be staying with her on a permanent basis for, basically, the first time in my life. But there had also been a lack of questions. Not a word wondering why I was leaving my entire life behind. No concern that my father's new girlfriend might be somehow abusive or otherwise bad for me.

There didn't seem to be any of the drama that should accompany such a major change in my life. A part of me was grateful. I didn't want the drama. I didn't want to be forced to offer explanations. But at the same time, part of me was wondering why it wasn't happening. Shouldn't Charlize, my _mother_, care enough that the drama would be inevitable and unavoidable. What did it mean that it apparently had been evited and avoided?

When we touched down in Port Angeles and I stepped out into the rain, I reminded myself that, while I might not be sure where she stood emotionally, Charlize had already started to help on the practical side of matters. She'd gotten me registered for high school and smoothed out the details involved in transferring schools in the middle of a term so that I wouldn't have to. She'd set up a bedroom for me in her house. She'd even promised to help me find a car.

That didn't stop my nagging feeling that things were going to suck, though.

Charlize was well aware that, like my father before me, I hated Forks. She had to be confused by my decision to come. She'd yet to bring that up. Not bringing it up at all would confuse me. If she brought it up inside the car that would be worse. The last thing I wanted was to be trapped in an awkward conversation because I was trapped inside a speeding car.

Not that Charlize was likely to be speeding, not too much at least. As the head cop in Forks she was outranked only by the mayor and even off duty and in her own car she tried to set a good, law abiding example.

My point is that as a passenger in a car I am always acutely aware of the fact that I'm trapped in an oddly shaped metal box that I cannot escape no matter how much the driver's actions or words might make me want to. An hour of going through that can be hell.

On the other hand, car rides can be not bad as well. Several hours of driving can be just fine.

xxxxxx

The back and forth thinking ended when Charlize gave me an awkward, uncertain, one armed hug as I stumbled out into the rain.

"It's good to see you, Ben," she said. She didn't mention it but I could feel her subtly adjusting the touch to keep me steady. Wet ground and I are not friends. She helped me with luggage and asked, "How's Ren?"

"Dad's fine," I said. With Charlize I didn't have to lie, but I'm still not one into long explanations and I'm not sure how much Charlize _wanted_ to know about Dad's new girlfriend. "It's good to see you too, mom."

I never could get into the whole thinking of people as "mom" and "dad". Add a "my" to it so it becomes clear which mom or dad you're talking about and I'm there, but without a qualifier it always struck me as impersonal and odd. And whenever I tried to explain to anyone I struck them as odd. Such is life I suppose.

That said, if Charlize liked me to call her "mom" rather than her name, I was capable of that. Thinking about her as _mom_, on the other hand, not so much.

xxxxxx

Everything I had fit into the trunk of her car. I travel light.

As I said, Charlize and I aren't big on talking and car rides together tend to involve listening to the radio while I look out the window and she drives. It looked like this was going to be one of those rides, which was confusing because I assumed she had questions, but better than being asked the questions I assumes she had. Then it turned out there was a third possibility.

"I got you a truck," she said.

It took me a while to process that. It took me a while to notice that my mouth was actually agape. I looked at her. I looked at the road ahead of us. I looked out my window. I looked back at the road ahead. I still wasn't sure what to think about that. Finally I said, "I have no idea what to say about that."

There was a long moment of... well not silence because the radio was on, but not-talking.

Then she said, "Well, I could tell you what I was afraid you'd say and what I hoped you'd say. Maybe that would give you some ideas."

"Sure."

"I was afraid you'd say, 'A truck? What would I want with a truck? I hate trucks. You're the worst mother ever.' I hoped you'd say, 'Thanks.'"

"You are not the worst mother ever."

"That's high praise."

"Can I see the truck before I decide how I feel about it?"

"Of course."

I tried to go back to looking out the window and listening to the music, but now I was curious. "So how old is it?"

"Well... it's older than I am."

"How much?"

The way she said, "Eleven years," made it pretty clear that she wished I'd asked something else first. She quickly added, "But it's in good repair."

So it was a truck, in good repair, from the 1950s. Assuming that she was right about that, though as far as I knew she didn't know anything more about trucks than I did, I had to wonder how she came across a well maintained truck half a century old. So I asked, "Where did you find it?"

"You remember Billie Black?"

Billie Black was one of my mother's best friends, we used to go fishing with her. She didn't live in Forks, but instead lived with her tribe in a place called La Push about 12 miles to the left. I definitely remembered her so I said, "Of course."

"Well... well she didn't need her truck anymore, so she let me have it cheap."

I didn't remember her truck, but I did remember that she seemed to really understand mechanical things; so if it was her truck I figured Charlize was probably right about it being in good repair. That brought up an entirely unrelated question, "Why doesn't she need it anymore?"

Charlize took a moment, before answering. "She's in a wheelchair now, and... that makes a truck from the 50s not really fit her anymore."

I wasn't prepared for that. "Was there an accident?"

"No. Diabetes." Charlize sighed. "It's not like she stopped being herself, and I don't want to pity her, but she was always so..." she didn't seem to know what to say, but I knew what she meant. Billie could never sit still. On dry land she was always on her feet, seldom running but always walking or at least standing. The only time she wasn't was when she was fishing, or, presumably, when she was driving the truck that I still couldn't remember. It seemed almost unimaginable that she couldn't stand any more. Charlize interrupted my thoughts by saying, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be dumping all this on your first day here."

"No, it's ok. I had to hear it sooner or later." I hadn't been to Forks in four years. Hearing about Billie really drove home what that might mean. I wasn't sure I was ready for how things had changed. I didn't really remember all that much of how things were, but already such a big part of what I did remember had been overturned.

"The bright side, such as there is one, is that you're getting a truck that's spent the last 20 years in the hands of a really competent mechanic. Try to dwell on that for now, and leave the rest for later."


End file.
